I am posting information gleaned from land records in the areas where our family’s ancestors resided. You can read more about this project in the overview. You may also check my deed record listing , which I will update often.

It has been nearly ten years since I went through the deed books in Wexford County, Michigan, at the court house in my old hometown, Cadillac. For various reasons, I have not completed analysis of the results of that effort. I am back at it today, headed sequentially through a set of deeds which contain the names of my Kaiser and Johnston ancestors in Wexford County, Michigan.

Date:

21 December 1882

Liber:

12

Page:

40

Location:

Wexford County, Michigan

Grantor:

Daniel Kaiser and Amanda Kaiser of Wexford County, Michigan

Grantee:

William Barnes of Grand Rapids, Kent County, Michigan

Witnesses:

Robert Christenson, John B. Rascoret

Type of deed:

Warranty

Rec’d and recording:

21 December 1882 2 p.m.

Clerk/registrar:

Thorp

Location of land:

Clam Lake, Wexford County, Michigan

Consideration:

$1,000

Notes:

Description:

The N1/2 of the SW1/4 of Sec 26 T21N R9W 80 acres

More than twenty years ago, I received a call from a friend of my M-in-L, she said, “I have your picture book.” I had no idea what she was talking about, but drove to her house, and paid the price she had for an old, worn photo album with a padded cover. I think I recognized it from the window seat in my grandmother’s house, but couldn’t be sure. After all, I was 6 when my grandmother passed away. But my cousin remember it pretty clearly, he said it had been in Jim’s office, Jim was my Dad. I did know that it was meant to me mine, pictures of my maternal grandmother’s family, and of her were labeled with little slips of paper with my Mother’s handwriting. One said, “Daniel and Manda Kaiser, uncle from Whaley Road.”

The land sold under this deed is in Clam Lake Township, which is in the southeast corner of Wexford County, bordering Missaukee county on its east side, and Osceola in its south. In this portion of the map from the 1889 Atlas of Wexford County, Daniel Keiser is listed as the owner of the land next to the 80 in this deed. I must have missed an earlier deed showing his purchase of this property. Mr. Barnes is nowhere in sight in 1889, he either never arrived, or stayed for a short time.

A fun fact I realized after I located the land on a more current plat map: Papa worked for the current owner of this farm during his high school years.